Chemistry Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 4.2
Top 10 Food Science and Technology journals
from 2005-2009 based on impact factor. The higher the
factor the more prestigious the journal
http://sciencewatch.
1. Critical Reviews in Food Science & Nutrition (8.96)
2. Trends in Food Science & Technology (7.38)
3. Molecular Nutrition & Food Research (6.82)
4. Food Additives and Contaminants (5.97)
5. International Dairy Journal (5.57)
6. International Journal of Food Microbiology (5.50)
7. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (5.44)
8. Biotechnology Progress (5.14)
9. Journal of Dairy Science (4.88)
10. Journal of Food Composition and Analysis (4.87)
personal database making it easier for us to keep up with the rapidly growing lit-
erature in our field.
While most of our reading should focus on primary articles, key review articles
can save us much time in searching through the older literature. If we find some
journals that are frequent sources for articles on our list, we can scan the titles in the
Table of Contents of key journals as soon as they become available. Also, we should
make sure we are keeping current by searching keywords, key authors, and citations
of key articles at least once a month. There are ways to receive alerts by e-mail with
keywords, authors, and citations of interest. Electronic means help us keep up to
date, but we should be careful not to rely on a single method of retrieval.
When keeping up with the literature in our research area, our personal database
of articles will accumulate rapidly. A typical MS thesis database should include at
least 200 articles with a Ph.D. database exceeding 500 articles. Developing a system
to manage this database is critical. For more details on conducting literature searches
and organizing our reference database, see Chap. 14.
Reading an Article
“Reading” a scientific article is NOT like reading a novel. It requires concentration
and close attention. It may not be as captivating or as entertaining as fiction. It does
not need to be read front to back. We should be prepared to take notes. Some scien-
tists work best with electronic copies, others find it easier to scratch up or highlight
paper copies. Do whatever works best. Before reading any article, it may help to ask
ourselves two questions:
•
Why am I reading this article?
•
What do I expect to learn from this article?
